Page 43 of So Close

He swung her out so they looked at each other down the length of both arms. Her smile was gone, and she was looking at him like—

Like she didn’t hate him.

Like shereallydidn’t fucking hate him.

He hadn’t thought he liked dancing. He hadn’t been bullshitting her. But apparently he just hadn’t tried it with the right person. Because this? This slow fucking burn? It was better than most actualsexhe’d had.

Which didn’t stop him from wishing he’d met Auburn under any other circumstances. And it sure as fuck didn’t stop him from wanting more.

21

It was the perfect night for a beach fire—clear and warm, with a little breeze.

She’d built the fire an hour ago and tended it ever since, and her guests had gradually come down to join her, sitting on log benches to form a cozy circle around the burning driftwood.

The fire had formed coals now, and she brought out the hotdogs and passed around the long metal forks with wooden handles.

Normally, there was no happier place for her than sitting by a beach fire, but tonight, she could barely sit still. She was so full of feelings, she couldn’t even tease them apart and name them.

She’d driven Carl home from the hospital earlier today—Brynn had been tied up with kid activities—and was thrilled to see that he’d seemed almost like his old self. He’d been so glad to see Beachcrest that his eyes had glistened with tears, which had made her weepy, too.

He’d wanted an update, of course, on thesituation.

Well?he’d demanded.Did he come around yet?

No, not yet, but…

But you’re doing a beach fire tonight, right? And tomorrow is the 4th. And no one does the 4th better than Beachcrest. Hehasto admit that.

No one does the 4th better than Beachcrest, she said, because she was sure about that. And pretty much nothing else.

The fact that she was helping Carl get resettled at Beachcrest had forced her to cancel the beach walk she’d had on the schedule for Trey. Which was maybe okay? Because she was still really confused about what had happened last night at the street dance. The dancing part.

If either of us talks, we’ll probably say something we’ll regret, don’t you think? And I’m enjoying this way too much for that.

She’d felt such a rush at that—as if he’d confessed way more than just that he liked dancing with her. And the way he’d looked at her a moment later, when she said,Do that thing again. Like she’d just asked for something dirty and perfect, something he’d been wanting to do for days. Her whole body had gone hot. Liquid.

He was sitting a short distance away. He’d arrived on the beach with his sister and the two boys in tow. He was wearing some of the clothes she’d picked out for him yesterday. And something had softened in his walk too. It wasn’t so much of a stride. More like a lope, now. Relaxed. He looked like a man on vacation.

He’d accepted a beer and a hot dog—speared it with a male wince on a long-handled barbecue fork—and thrust it into the heat of the coals. He’d taken a second fork and was fire-roasting two more dogs for his nephews. And he hadn’t even given Auburn a lecture on the dangers of processed meat or fillers. Or the carbs and gluten in beer.

He was smiling and laughing, chatting with the fishermen about how he used to go fly fishing with his dad in Montana when he was a little kid. He finished up his hot dog, tugged it off the fork with a white-bread bun—no griping about the white carbs, either—and took a huge bite.

“Damn,” he said to no one in particular. “I forgot how good these are.”

Part of her was elated. She’d doneexactlywhat she’d set out to do. She was maybe even a little ahead of schedule, since he was already in an expansive mood and they hadn’t even broken out the marshmallows.

She’d turned a businessman into a beach rat in seventy-two hours.

And unless she was very much mistaken, she had at least a fighting chance at convincing Trey that Beachcrest belonged right where it was—and right as it was.

Then why was she all churned up inside? She was accomplishing just what she wanted.

And yet she wanted something else, too. For his attention to leave the hot dogs and his nephews and the fishermen and settle on her. For him to stand up from the log where he sat, cross to where she was, and sit too close for casual conversation. Close enough that the heat of his body would outshine the heat of the fire.

She wanted him to linger at the fire after the other guests left and—

And more.

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